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Jeter and Team Agree: His Season Is Finished

Derek Jeter, who will turn 40 next June, vowed to return for the 2014 season.Credit
Barton Silverman/The New York Times

BALTIMORE — Giving up on a season is not something Derek Jeter has ever wanted to contemplate, but with his surgically repaired left ankle refusing to cooperate, Jeter and the Yankees finally conceded the inevitable.

Jeter, the 39-year-old shortstop and team captain, was placed on the 15-day disabled list Wednesday, but he will not play even if the Yankees make the playoffs. His season, General Manager Brian Cashman said, is over, and Jeter agreed.

“The entire year has pretty much been a nightmare physically,” Jeter said. “So I guess it’s fitting that it ends like this, huh?”

It took four setbacks after his original injury — a broken ankle sustained in Game 1 of the American League Championship Series on Oct. 13 — and four trips to the disabled list before reality overcame Jeter’s will to play.

Cashman said he decided to end Jeter’s season Wednesday afternoon after consulting with Hal Steinbrenner, the Yankees’ managing general partner, and Dr. Robert Anderson, the surgeon who operated on Jeter’s ankle in October.

No new injury was discovered, Cashman said, but Anderson told him that although the broken bone in the ankle had healed, the surrounding muscle tissue, ligaments and tendons were still adjusting to the trauma of two fractures and an operation. If Jeter continued playing, Cashman said, he would risk further injury, perhaps even another break. With an eye toward 2014, they were not willing to take that risk.

“The worst-case scenario is a break,” Cashman said. “We cannot be in that position to have a break, because then you could be talking about a career-ending situation if he rebroke that thing. And we’re not going to put him in that position.”

By Tuesday night, Cashman was willing to consider the possibility of shutting Jeter down, and he acquired shortstop Brendan Ryan from the Seattle Mariners. Ryan arrived Wednesday and was in the starting lineup. He became the 55th player to step on the field for the Yankees this season, extending the club record for players used in a season.

On Wednesday afternoon, Cashman met with Jeter. Almost to his surprise, Jeter did not resist. It was not only a matter of still feeling pain in the ankle 11 months after the initial break. Jeter also said his level of play was not close to his standards.

“If you can’t play how you’re capable of playing and do what you’re used to doing, then you’re not really helping out,” Jeter said.

In 17 games, Jeter was batting .190 with a home run and a double. When he could not even plant his left foot to make a proper throw Saturday, he was lifted from a game against the Boston Red Sox. It ended up being his final game of the year.

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With the worst season of his career behind him, Jeter vowed that he would rest the ankle in the coming weeks while cheering on his team from the dugout. Then he will begin his usual off-season conditioning and training routine in anticipation of returning in 2014 for his 20th season with the Yankees. Jeter holds a $9.5 million player option for next season.

“I truly believe with a full off-season of working out and getting my strength back that I’ll get back to doing what I’ve always done,” he said.

Teammates, used to seeing Jeter on the field virtually every day for the past 18 seasons, were disheartened by the news.

“It’s hard,” Alex Rodriguez said. “You know how hard he’s been working to come back and how much he wants to play and help the team win. That’s what he’s all about, so for it to come to this, you know it’s crushing.”

After collapsing to the infield dirt in the 12th inning of Game 1 of the A.L.C.S. last year, Jeter had a goal of playing on opening day. But he sustained another fracture in the ankle in March and had to go on the disabled list for the first time.

At the time of the initial break, Jeter had been playing through a bone bruise in his ankle and received cortisone shots to alleviate the pain and inflammation, which he said may have led to the injury. But Jeter, who was in the midst of a 216-hit season, said he did not have regrets.

“Would I change?” he said. “No. My job is to play. You play. You try to do your job as well as you can. I’ve always said, ‘If it’s not broke, keep playing.’ It broke.”

He made his 2013 debut on July 11, but he injured his right quadriceps and returned to the D.L. Then he injured his right calf in his first game back and had to go on the D.L. again, raising concerns that he might be incapable of playing again. But that is not how Jeter or the Yankees see it.

“I have not watched his last game,” Cashman said. “No one has.”

A version of this article appears in print on September 12, 2013, on Page B15 of the New York edition with the headline: Jeter and Team Agree: His Season Is Finished. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe